I’m 22 years old, recently graduated and looking for a job. I’ve been back home for about 2 months living with my mom. I have one younger brother who is currently away studying for his degree.

My parents separated when I was 19. They’ve had problems for years, but three years ago was when they finally stopped talking to each other. They are not legally divorced yet.

We come from an Indian background and only moved to the UK because mom got a job here. Now my dad lives in India and Mom lives here in the UK with us.

My mom has always worked abroad so we never saw much of her when we were young, only once or twice a year. Dad was working too and our grandparents (his parents) took care of us while they were away. Dad has always been very close with his family.

When I was about 13, dad quit his job and we moved to his hometown closer to all the rest of his family. We loved it, we spent every day with our cousins, who were of similar age, and had lots of fun. My mom got a job in England and would visit us twice every year.

My brother and I don’t have any memories of all four of us being happy together. Our parents always fought about one thing or the other. It got so bad that we weren’t happy anymore when Mom would tell us she was visiting.

Well fast-forward a few years, my parents decided that they wanted to live together like a normal family so we moved to England when I was 16. It was horrible! They fought pretty much every day. When they didn’t fight, they would turn to us and scold us for the silliest things ever!

From what I and my brother understood my Mom hated my Dad’s family, especially one of his sister-in-law’s whom everybody in my family adored. She was insanely jealous of her and would say stuff about her and her husband (my Dad’s brother) which made my Dad upset. Then she would say she didn’t understand why my Dad was sticking up for her! She then started twisting things and would say nasty things about her and my Dad has had a relationship and that one of my cousins was their son!!

These fights got really nasty. My dad couldn’t even speak to his family on the phone, without my mom starting a fight! They would both get really angry, physically and verbally violent too! Most of the times we were away at school but when we weren’t, they took the anger out on us.

Eventually, my Dad had had enough and realized this was affecting our education, so decided to move back to India on his own. It was very upsetting for me and my brother as we had not lived without our Dad before. But it was also better because we didn’t have to come home to our parents shouting and swearing at each other!

Things calmed down for a bit. Some of their friends convinced them to forget all the things in the past and make the relationship work. So, Mom, my brother and I went to India to visit our grandparents, cousins and mainly, to bring Dad back home.

But this is when Mom started getting very controlling. She wouldn’t let us visit our cousins because she didn’t like the sister-in-law. She kept saying they would manipulate us and say nasty things about her to us! My Dad found out about all this and another big fight started where she started swearing at my grandparents and my Dad!

We were so upset and she basically threatened us that she would leave us in India and stop paying for us if we continued talking to Dad’s family.

Since then, we’ve told them that we wanted them to get divorced. My mom asked him to give her all the property in India because apparently, she paid for it. My Dad agreed to give half and she eventually she agreed. But now, they still won’t get a divorce because they think society will look down upon them (typical Indians eh)!!

They are always asking me and my brother to solve it, we don’t know what to do! We are fed up of both of them.

We love them both, but not together and we’ve told them this several times.

My Dad is an idiot who gave up his job and relied solely on Mom’s income, denying her a family living in the process. He also would turn into a different person in front of others, he would always boss about and make fun of my mom in front of people to look more macho. He would also get physically violent, a common trait among most Indian men (although things are changing in today’s society). He also sold all her gold when he was angry and nobody knows what he did with the money.

On the other hand, my Mom is another idiot who put up with his behavior for so many years! She was also verbally abusive, manipulative and never said a nice word about anybody. She made up stories about Dad and called everybody he knew and told them about it.

She is also having an affair with a married man right now (which I only recently found out about because she asked me to fix her iPad and I found messages) and still constantly calls people that know my Dad to tell them about the ‘sexual relationship’ he had with his sister-in-law and how his brother let it happen.

She still tries to stop us from having a relationship with our Dad and his family but we don’t let her tell us what to do. Every day, she keeps telling us about how my Dad has been unfaithful and on cheated her. When we ask her why she didn’t leave him earlier, she starts crying and says it was all for us. She constantly reminds us of all the sacrifices she made to make money for us.

When we call our Dad, he says he’s willing to give her another chance if she apologizes to his family and decides to get treatment for what he believes is a psychological disorder.

My mother still wants to know what she did wrong!! When we speak to Dad, he is calmer and tells us to take care of her as she has been providing for us up until now.

My mom calls random people and discusses all these issues and apparently they’ve all told her that “Since the kids are old enough, they should solve this problem”.

We love Mom because she has always provided for us and we had everything we ever wanted, material things, that is. We equally love our Dad, because he was so loving and took care of us, fed us, etc. till we were about 15-16. But now, Mom wants us to disown our Dad and his family which we will never do, no matter how much she emotionally blackmails us!

I am so tired of all this because every chance mom gets she bad mouths my Dad and his family. This happens every day! I’m tired of arguing about this with her! Now I just pretend not to listen.

What should we do? What would you do if you were in this situation?

I love both of them and want them to be happy, but what can I do if they keep making excuses to not get a divorce? Do you think this relationship is toxic because I certainly do! Help!